Such a braking control system for a vehicle is already known, for example, in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 6-298022. This braking control system is designed so that when the contact of the vehicle with the object can be avoided only by the steering operation, the avoidance of the contact is performed by the steering operation without carrying out an automatic braking operation, and in the case of emergency where the contact of the vehicle with the object cannot be avoided by only the steering operation, the automatic braking operation is carried out to enable the avoidance of the contact.
The automatic braking operation is effective for avoiding the contact of the vehicle with the object. However, at present, it is technically difficult to avoid the contact of the vehicle with the object in a perfect automatic braking operation due to the limits of the accuracy of detection of an object detecting means such as a laser radar. Therefore, desirably, it is premised that a driver basically carries out the braking operation of his or her own will and, in case the driver conducts an erroneous operation, the braking operation is assisted by the automatic braking operation. For this purpose, it is required that, respecting the braking operation carried out by the driver, the automatic braking operation be carried out so as not to interfere with such driver's braking operation, thereby to effectively achieve the avoidance of the contact.
The present invention has been accomplished with the above circumstances in view, and it is an object of the present invention to effectively avoid the contact of the vehicle with an object, while preventing the automatic braking operation from interfering with the braking provided by the braking operation carried out by the driver.